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PhD defence | Doctoral concert

Doctoral Concert Adam Lukawski

Date
Thursday 20 November 2025
Time
Address
Royal Conservatoire The Hague, Amare

Room
Studio 6

ACPA cordially invites you to the concert and the public defense of the doctoral research project entitled Performative Transactions: Worlding Compositional Ecosystems by composer and computer programmer Adam Łukawski. 

The public defense of his dissertation, on 21 November 2025, 10.00 hrs. at the Academy Building of Leiden University, will be preceded by a final doctoral concert on 20 November at 17.00 hrs. in Studio 6, Royal Conservatoire, Amare, The Hague. The concert will feature works composed with AI and blockchain technologies during the research process for the MIDI-controlled instruments built by Godfried Willem-Raes (Logos Foundation), together with a performance by Ensemble Modelo62 conducted by Ezequiel Menalled and an exhibition of generative music NFTs.

In this doctoral research, composer Adam Łukawski investigates how emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and blockchain are reshaping the roles of artists and the very processes of composition. Combining artistic experimentation, philosophical reflection, and software development, the project redefines the composer not only as a creator of sounds or scores, but as a designer of systems through which composition itself can unfold.
Łukawski introduces four contemporary artistic roles — artist as operator, curator, system-builder, and world-builder — and develops corresponding compositional methods. The research culminates in the design of a conceptual framework called the Autopoietic Rhizomatic Metamodelling Machine (ARMM) and its technical implementation in Decentralised Creative Networks (DCNs) — blockchain-based ecosystems where human and non-human agents can collaboratively compose.

At the centre of this infrastructure is the idea of Performative Transactions: modular, executable processes that encode and transform compositional operations while ensuring full transparency and provenance. Together, these tools enable what Łukawski calls allagmatic composition — a form of music creation in which the compositional system itself becomes the artwork.

Through new compositions, software prototypes, and an educational programme (Posthuman Creativity Labs), the dissertation proposes a vision of artistic practice grounded in procedural transparency, recursive design, and decentralised collaboration, inviting a future where music is composed not just by individuals, but within evolving creative ecosystems.

Event schedule

Concert
20 November at 17.00
Studio 6
Royal Conservatoire, Amare, The Hague

Public defense
21 November at 10.00
Great Auditorium
Academy Building, Leiden University
Rapenburg 73, Leiden

Watch the livestream

Supervisors

Prof.dr. Richard Barrett
Professor of Research in Creative Music, Academy of Creative and Performing Arts (ACPA), Leiden University

Dr. Paulo de Assis
Orpheus Institute Ghent

Dr. Michiel Schuijer
Conservatory of Amsterdam

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